


Padawan's Trial

by were_lemur



Category: Star Wars, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-04-20
Updated: 2010-04-20
Packaged: 2017-10-09 01:31:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/81527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/were_lemur/pseuds/were_lemur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even the least likely of Padawans can be used by the Force.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Trial

She'd been walking through the Temple for what seemed like forever -- not the timelessness of the Force, but the eternity of an unpleasant task that would -- she hoped -- help make her a Jedi. Padawan Givera Mayak put one foot in front of the other, taking turns at random, trying to let the Force guide her.

That was her biggest weakness. She had lost track of the number of times Master Temmik had told her; "You think too much, Padawan." She was trying not to think about how much thinking she did; a difficult task. She wondered when Master Temmik would decide she was ready for the Trials, (or if she _ever_ would be ready), and there she was again. Thinking too much.

She shook her head, annoyed. She could not-think for a few minutes, but then she would realize that she was not-thinking, which was a thought, and her brain kept going around and around. She wished she could go to the training rooms; it was easier not to think when she was doing something else.

Annoyed, she picked up the pace to nearly a jog, and tried again to let the Force guide her. But she suspected that she was just moving.

It was a moment before she realized that she was unconsciously following another fast-moving figure. It was Master Skywalker, and he looked like he was in a hurry. Or maybe he was meditating, too.

She shouldn't be wondering that. "Open myself to the will of the Force," she murmured.

Though if the Force wanted something done, wouldn't it have someone else do it? The Temple was full of actual Knights and Masters. Like Master Skywalker; her feet were still following him as he turned into the hangar bay. She felt her face go hot; what if he noticed, and thought she was following him?

He was obviously on Council business; as soon as he cleared the door, he broke into a run. She watched him leap into a speeder and take off.

She found herself beside another of the speeders. She wasn't actually thinking of following him, was she?

She should go back to her meditations. Keep walking, until she felt the Force again. Or until Master Temmik took pity on her and let her go to bed.

So why was she sitting in the cockpit of the speeder?

The whole Temple was locked down. If she left now, she'd have to explain everything when she got back. The best case was that she'd feel stupid. And what if Master Skywalker was on a covert mission, and she blew his cover?

_You think too much, Padawan,_ she imagined Master Temmik's voice, _you need to trust the Force_ She closed her eyes, and opened herself.

The speeder roared to life beneath her.

While she'd argued with herself, Master Skywalker had gotten a good lead on her, but she wasn't worried. It might have been her hands on the speeder's controls, but it was the Force that was doing the navigating.

She was only vaguely surprised when her destination came into view. She stared at the High Council Tower, her mind open.

She was already pushing her speeder into a dive, when one of the rooms fills with lighting. She saw something hurtle from the window and down; the thinking part of her mind was trying to calculate intercept vectors and gibbering words like _terminal velocity_ but the part of her that was deep in the Force was acting, hands steady on the controls.

The speeder was nearly vertical, riding at the edge of control, when she reached the falling object. She pulled up on the control yoke, and a body slammed down into the passenger's seat. The weight knocked the speeder almost on its side, spinning it out of control. She fought for control and corrected course just before it hit the wall, and it was only then that she realized that it was Master Windu in the passenger's seat. For a moment lightning played across his features, but then it faded out.

"Master Windu, are you all right?" No answer. She eased the speeder to a halt, and knelt up in the seat. "Master Windu?"

As suddenly as it came, the calm of the Force was gone. Givera was terrified. "Master Windu, please wake up." She shook his shoulder lightly; his head lolled forward. Givera pressed her fingers against his neck, searching for a pulse. His skin felt cold. After what seemed like forever, she felt a weak pulse. It was even longer before she felt another one, and he still hadn't taken a breath.

"You can't die." The words were almost a sob. "You have to breathe."

Nothing.

She pressed her hand to his chest, reached into the Force, willing him to live. "Breathe!"

He sucked one wheezing breath and let it rattle out. Givera tilted his head back to make his breathing easier. His chest settled into a shallow, but steady, rise-and-fall; when she checked his pulse again it was regular. She ran her hands across his body, checking for any injury that could kill him before she got him back to the Temple.

His right hand was gone at the wrist; she recognized the characteristic self-cauterization of a lightsaber wound.

He wouldn't bleed out. Any internal injuries could be taken care of at the Temple. And they'd be able to figure out was wrong with him. "Just hang on," she murmured. "We'll be there in a few minutes, somebody will know what to do -- "

"Speeder pilot!" a mechanical voice called. "You are in a restricted area. Move your speeder to the nearest horizontal surface and shut off your repulsors."

She almost did it; once they saw her credentials they'd let her go. But then she looked at Master Windu. Whoever had made him fall probably thought he was dead; she needed to get him back to the Temple before they found out otherwise. She knew better than to think that she could protect him against whoever had almost killed him.

She slammed the accelerator, and the speeder leapt forward.

"Speeder pilot. Surrender immediately, or face deadly force!"

She dodged around a slow-moving delivery vehicle. She needed cover, she needed to get back to the Temple ...

The security droids were still on her tail, but at least they were only gaining slowly. She took advantage of the straight course to strap Master Windu in.

Just in time. Her escape route narrowed to a thin crack between buildings. She twisted the speeder on its side and shot the gap.

The tiny security droids had no problems, of course.

She came out the other side -- but another droid was waiting for her. She found herself ducking a blaster bolt she hadn't even seen.

She gritted her teeth, and slammed into the droid. It let out an electronic squeal as it tumbled away. But that still left the original two.

She'd never lose them on her own. She craned her neck and saw the traffic lanes high above. She pulled back on the yoke put the speeder into an extreme climb. The engines whined in protest.

But she made it.

She burst up onto the traffic lane to a cacophony of honking, but managed to avoid a collision. She twisted her way into the lane, and matched speed. Blended into traffic. She was heading the wrong way, but she wanted to put some distance between herself and the security droids before heading back to the Temple.

After a few tense minutes, she set the autopilot to take the speeder back to the Temple, and turned back to Master Windu. He was breathing easily, now; his pulse was stronger. "Now would be a really good time for you to wake up," Givera told him, but he didn't respond.

They were almost back to the Temple, when he moaned in pain. Givera turned to see if he was waking up -- but then she felt it too.

Across the galaxy, Jedi were dying. And not just one or two -- _all_ of them.

She saw, now, that the Jedi Temple was in flames. And she felt her training bond flicker out. "Master Temmik!" she screamed.

Sick rage threatened to engulf her. She'd never understood before how someone could fall to the Dark Side -- now she knew all too well. She could dive her speeder in, kill as many of her attackers as she could --

A flick of a switch turned the autopilot off. She set the speeder into a dive. There was nothing left --

Master Windu moaned again.

"No," she whispered.

She couldn't throw her life away -- not while she had one more duty. As long as Master Windu was alive, there was hope.

She pulled the speeder out of the dive. Just in time -- she'd been spotted. With sick horror, she realized that the Temple was crawling with clonetroopers. She was too low to overshoot; she had no choice but to turn; that gave them enough time to catch sight of her. Givera saw one of them bring his deece up to bear; it was all she could to evade the shot. But she managed, heading for the dubious safety of the open speeder lanes.

The deece's second shot fried the speeder's starboard repulsor.

The speeder started to plummet.

She was going to die. After everything, she was going to die.

"There is no death," Givera murmured, "there is the Force." She dove deep into it, preparing for the moment of impact. But instead, she felt her hands on the controls, turning the port repulsor on and off in quick bursts, keeping the speeder out of a deadly spin.

They crippled speeder dropped through the layers of the city; Givera looked around for somewhere to land. She nudged it forward -- but then the port repulsor gave out, too. The speeder, uncontrolled, hit a slanted roof, and slid, spinning on its belly. Givera clung to the steering yoke, screaming in primal terror. She saw the wall coming and squeezed her eyes shut --

The roof gave way and dropped the speeder a few more meters. It landed with a crunch of durasteel, slid to the side, and stopped.

Givera opened her eyes, and peeled her fingers from the control yoke. She had the horrible thought that when she looked at Master Windu he would be dead, impaled by wreckage, but his breathing was deep and even, his heartbeat strong. When she shook him gently, his eyelids fluttered once, but did not rise.

She would wait. Sooner or later, Master Windu would wake up. And he would know what to do. How to save what remained of the Jedi Order.

It was the will of the Force.


	2. SitRep

In the ruins of a Coruscanti warehouse, Jedi Padawan Givera Mayak sat and watched and waited. Beside her, in the wrecked airspeeder, Master Windu's eyelids fluttered. He moaned once, softly, and his face twisted in pain.

Givera reached out to try and help. Before she could figure out what to do, though, his face returned to the stony control she'd seen when she'd accompanied Master Temmik to stand before the Council.

The thought of Master Temmik was enough to remind her of everything she'd seen, everything she'd _felt_, since she'd followed Master Skywalker to the Senate Building. Of the Temple in flames, of feeling her training bond flicker out --

She clamped down hard on her grief and loss, and returned her attention to Master Windu. He took three deep breaths, then opened his eyes. For a long moment, he stared down to the stump where his hand had been.

Finally, his gaze shifted to Givera. "Padawan ... "

"Mayak, Master," she supplied.

"Padawan Mayak, I need your full report."

She fought to keep her voice as even as Master Windu's. "I was trying to meditate -- to feel the will of the Force. I found myself following Master Skywalker."

Master Windu flinched -- so slightly that she could almost have missed it. "Continue," he ordered her.

"I followed Master Skywalker to the Senate office building. I don't know how long I waited, before I put the speeder into the dive. You were falling -- when I caught you, I thought I saw lightning. I didn't see what happened to Master Skywalker."

"Anakin Skywalker," he said, "is no longer a Jedi."

She stared, open-mouthed, at Master Windu. It was all too much to take in. If Master Skywalker wasn't a Jedi any more, and the Temple had burned, did that mean --

Master Windu's voice steadied her. "Continue your report."

"I was chased by security droids. I escaped, and returned to the Temple. It was on fire. Clones were -- were killing everybody." _There is no death,_ she reminded herself. _There is the Force._

Suddenly, it seemed like very cold comfort, indeed. "I should have told them," she said. "I should have contacted them as soon as you fell."

"They were already as prepared as they could have been," Master Windu said. "There was nothing more they could have done."

Whether it was true or not, she needed to focus on the moment, not the past. "So what do we do now?"

Suddenly Master Windu looked tired, as if he'd aged a dozen years overnight. He slumped forward, his head drooping. But he straightened, as if by an act of will. "We should leave the area, before someone comes looking for us."

Not exactly a grand plan for saving the Jedi, but she had to admit it had a certain practical value. She hopped out of the car; Master Windu pushed himself to his feet and limped slowly toward the door. Too slowly; Givera slipped her shoulders under his arm to support his weight.

They'd just cleared the door when a light shone down through the hole in the ceiling. The search had started already.


	3. Desperate Measures

As the light swept across the warehouse floor, Padawan Givera Mayak wrapped her fingers around the hilt of her lightsaber. But Master Windu put his hand on her wrist, shook his head.

She barely dared to breathe; their pursuers might have listening devices too. Might have a whole squadron of troopers up there looking for them. Might be waiting to drop in a flash-bang or something deadlier -- _p for plenty_, Kaver had told her once.

She wondered if Kaver -- or Toll or Ramic or Carud or any of the dozens of troopers she'd fought beside -- had been at the Temple. If one of them had killed Master Temmik.

_There is no passion, there is serenity._ She let out her breath and with it her grief, her anger, her thirst for revenge. Emptied of everything but the Force, she waited as the light swept past the door, and then re-angled. After a long moment, it disappeared altogether. She listened as the craft (the detached part of her mind recognized it as a larty) moved on.

For now.

"They'll be back," Master Windu said what she'd been thinking.

"Where do we go?"

"Down," he said. "We need to make it to street level." He closed his eyes for a long moment, swaying on his feet.

Givera tightened her grip around his waist, tugged at him until he took a step. "Then what?"

"Lie low." His voice sounded like it came from far away. "Find a way off-planet."

"All right," she said. She helped Master Windu limp along the corridor to the lift-tube. But when she touched the plate, there was no response. The power was down.

They'd have to find the stairs.

In the dim light, Givera saw Master Windu's eyes defocus for a moment. Then he pointed back the way they had come. "That way," he said.

She tightened her grip on his belt, taking as much of his weight as she could, and they ventured into the dark bowels of the abandoned building.

*

"Chancellor."

Palpatine looked up at the white-armored trooper expectantly. But the clone's words were not at all the reassuring confirmation he had been expecting.

"We were unable to locate Master Windu's remains."

Cold fear flashed through him. "I _gave_ you the location," he snarled.

The trooper took an involuntary half-step back. "We will redouble our efforts, Chancellor."

Palpatine dismissed the trooper from his office and his mind, filled with the cold certainly that they would not find what they were looking for. Instead, he called up his head of security.

Minutes scraped by and turned to hours as the security analysts compiled scraps of information, sought connections. And finally, found a possibility ...

*

In the utter dark of the stairs, Givera had lost track of time. She'd fallen into a rhythm -- step down with her left foot, wait for Master Windu to get his left foot and then, carefully, his right foot down, and once he was steady, put her own right foot down.

She didn't even realize that it was getting lighter until she saw that one of the lights in the stairwell was flickering.

"Do you think that the lift tube will work on this level?"

"Go and check," Master Windu said. His voice was weak. "I'll wait here."

She frowned at him, unsure. "Master ... "

"I just need to rest for a few minutes."

"All right," Givera said reluctantly. "I'll be back as soon as I can."

She sprinted off into the semi-darkness

*

"Chancellor, we received a report of an airspeeder loitering in a restricted area near Master Windu's projected trajectory. It evaded the security droids and escaped. A similar vehicle was reported as being shot down near the Jedi Temple; it has not been recovered.

Palpatine felt the cold knot around his malformed body. Intellectually, he knew that the Force Lightning had been enough to kill Windu -- but he had not accomplished the downfall of the Jedi by leaving anything to chance. He reached out into the Force -- and found it full of the echoes of dying Jedi.

If Windu was alive, he was insignificant against the clamor.

For a moment, he considered sending Vader in search of the mysterious speeder, but dismissed the idea. His young apprentice was still too fragile. Having him kill Windu for a second time that night might be too much.

He needed to get him off-planet, out of the way, for a few days.

Besides, even if Windu was alive, he would be weak. This was a job that could be delegated. Palpatine looked at his head of security. "I want that speeder found, and the remains of all occupants brought to me."

"If there are survivors -- "

"I don't want _survivors_," he snarled. "Consider them armed and extremely dangerous."

*

Even at this level, most of the lift tubes were down. Finally, at the far side of the building, miles away, Givera found a cargo tube that came to her summons. She started the long jog back to Master Windu.

She was halfway back, when a black cloak of terror passed over her. She was being hunted, she had to hide --

As quickly as it had come, it was gone. But it left a lingering fear behind. She had to get to Master Windu.

It seemed to take forever to reach the stairwell, and she was certain that Master Windu would be dead. But he opened his eyes when he heard her approach, and pulled himself to his feet. "He's looking for me."

"Then we have to go." She slid herself into position, and they began the long walk.

Though Master Windu had regained some strength, it didn't last long. By the time they'd been walking half an hour, she was taking as much of his weight as before; halfway there, she was supporting him almost completely as he stumbled along, his head down, all his strength going to the effort of putting one foot in front of the other. He was sweating as if he'd run the whole way.

Givera started playing games with herself -- telling herself she just had to reach the next light fixture or door. And then the next one, and the next, and she had to keep going because the sense of being hunted was still with her.

She could just make out the lift-tube that was her goal in the distance, when Master Windu staggered as if he'd taken a body-blow. He dropped to his knees; only Givera's grip on his belt kept him from collapsing completely.

"Master Windu, what's -- "

"Depa ... " The name was nearly a moan.

Givera remembered hearing that Master Billaba had been injured on a mission and was incapacitated. She'd been in the Healers' wing -- and once the Temple was secure, the troopers would have gone there and started executing the helpless patients.

Master Windu must have felt her death.

Givera tightened her hold on his belt and drew on the Force for strength. If he couldn't walk, she'd have to carry him. But as she shifted to get him into position, the knowledge came to her -- he'd suffocate under his own weight.

She froze, realizing for the first time what had been done to him. How the lightning she'd seen fading when he fell had stolen his strength, his will, his fighting spirit. He'd been calling on the Force to keep moving.

But now, Master Billaba's death had broken him.

Givera let out a sob. If he died, everything was lost. And she could feel his life ebbing away with every shallow breath. "Please, please stay with me!"

His only response was to sag lower.

She could think of only one thing that might wake him. Except ... could she be that cruel?

She could.

She straightened and dragged Master Windu up onto his knees. "If you die, the order dies. Is that what you want?" She grabbed his chin and tilted it up. "Is that what _Master Billaba_ would want?"

He took a deep breath, and opened his eyes. Got one foot under him. Givera pulled him to his feet. But even as she got him moving again, she knew that she had to find someplace to hide -- and _soon_. Even calling on the Force, it was only a matter of time before he collapsed.


End file.
